As we approach kickoff and countdown the days until our beloved sport is back, there are plenty of preseason rankings and ratings coming out. Everyone and their mother has a preseason ranking or rating and there is one list in particular that I like to take a look at before the season. Kelley Ford’s preseason ratings is one of my favorite lists out there. He does an excellent job breaking down teams using advanced numbers and truly is one of the best to do it.
His list includes all 134 FBS teams which means that all 16 Big 12 teams are in his rankings. Here are where the teams in the Big 12 fall on his list.
- Utah – No. 17
- Kansas State – No. 19
- Oklahoma State – No. 21
- Kansas – No. 25
- Arizona – No. 28
- TCU – No. 31
- Iowa State – No. 32
- West Virginia – No. 34
- UCF – No. 35
- Texas Tech – No. 38
- Colorado – No. 42
- Baylor – No. 49
- Cincinnati – No. 54
- BYU – No. 68
- Arizona State – No. 76
- Houston – No. 77
The first thing that jumps out to me is that no Big 12 team is inside the top 15. I feel like Utah and Kansas State are extremely too low here. To me, Utah should be a lock in the top 10.
Oklahoma State, Kansas, Arizona, and Iowa State are all around where I would put them, although I think the Cyclones have a case to be inside the top 25. The middle-tier team in the Big 12 that sticks out like a sore thumb to me is TCU.
They were picked to finish tenth in the Big 12 preseason poll, yet they’re the sixth highest-rated Big 12 team for Ford — that feels a bit wild to me.
After that, we see a whole mess of teams stuck together, with West Virginia, UCF, Texas Tech, and Colorado all within eight spots of each other. Someone from that group will likely fall, and someone will rise up. I have no issue with any of the rankings for this particular group of teams.
Finally, we get down to the conference’s bottom feeders. While I personally would have Arizona State above BYU, their placement here wasn’t egregious. However, putting Arizona State and Houston back-to-back was certainly interesting, as it feels like there might be more separation between those two teams than it appears here.
Keep in mind that these are projections. While there will be some similarities when the season ends, I don’t expect these teams to end up where they are projected. It seems like every year in the Big 12, we get one of those teams that come out of nowhere and shocks everyone. Who will that team be this season? It’s anyone’s guess.
